Some interesting stats about Patreon.
Happy Friday, friend!
Thanks for taking a couple of minutes to sit with me and allow me to rant a bit. Here’s what’s on my mind…
Patreon isn’t what it seems…
Now, I’ve been preaching this for a while, but I dug around and got some interesting statistics that perked up my ears and made me consider making a more deep dive piece around this idea.
Stat #1 - Only 0.3% of creators on Patreon receive financial support from over 2,000 patrons. (You can check out the article here.) This equates to just 600 people on the platform. 600. There are over 200,000 people using patreon currently.
So this made me ask the question - “how much money are people actually making on average?”
Which lead me to this fact.
Stat #2 - In 2016, only 31% of its creators made more than $100 on the platform. (You can check out the article here.)
This means that 69% of all creators made LESS than $100 TOTAL on Patreon in 2016. And yes, it’s 2022 now, but if we said that 31% made over $100 now, that’s still only 62,000 creators. And if only .3% have over 2,000 backers, I can’t imagine that the revenue climbs much until you get to the top 1% - much like the U.S. economy I suppose.
Why do I care about this?
Well, because I hate seeing artists put time into things that look like the “fastest route” to making money, that are actually incredibly slow like everything else. Plus, without a substantial amount of backers, the odds are pretty high that you’re making just a few dollars an hour to fulfill your promises to those amazing patrons of yours.
I’m considering making a deeper dive piece on this, and would love to know what kind of questions you might ask, or if you think this is an interesting rabbit to chase.
Just remember to do the math and make sure you’re getting paid what you’re worth when you’re working to make money from your creativity. It’ll take you WAY less time to find one person that will pay you $1000 than it will to find 100 people that will pay you $10.
This feels like such a timely read. I've been considering whether to start one or not for ages. If you're doing a deep dive, I'd also like to know how much Patreon profits from having creatives on the platform. From what I've heard they keep changing the fees. That and the added fees from payment processing, altogether seems like it's not that beneficial for creatives.
WOW! That IS fascinating. I used to be active on Patreon each month, and it felt like a lot of work for an extra $130/mo. Now it did help to buy extra gear I was needing, but ultimately as you know, I didn't see the value in continuing to put that effort there. It's hard to build something like that off the platform you're using. You have to commit long term. I have seen it work for a few, but for every one, I know 10+ where it hasn't.